Top | Saveur Cooks Authentic Italian

Bagna Cauda

(recipe, Saveur Magazine)


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Introduction

In Piedmont, winemakers celebrate the end of the grape harvest each year with a dinner that begins with bagna cauda (literally, “warm bath”) and ends, according to tradition, with eggs scrambled in the last traces of the sauce.

Ingredients

  1. ½ cup butter
  2. 10 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
  3. 24 oil-packed anchovies, chopped
  4. 2 cups extra-virgin olive oil
  5. Salt and freshly ground black pepper
  6. 4 cardoon stalks, washed
  7. Juice of 1 lemon
  8. 4 to 6 lb. assorted raw vegetables, at least 4 varieties (fennel, baby artichokes, Belgian endive, carrots, radicchio, celery, etc.), washed, trimmed, and cut into pieces

Steps

  1. Melt butter in a small saucepan over low heat. Add garlic and cook until soft, about 3 minutes. Add anchovies and drizzle in olive oil. Cook over low heat, crushing anchovies slightly with a fork and stirring until flavors are blended, 10 to 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and keep warm.
  2. Carefully cut thorns and leaves off cardoon stalks, then peel with a swivel vegetable peeler. Cut cardoons into pieces 3 to 4 inches long and put into a medium bowl with lemon juice and water to cover.
  3. To serve, arrange the vegetables on a platter and put the anchovy-garlic sauce into a warm bowl so that each diner can dip vegetables into the sauce.

Note

Culinate editor's note: For a smoother-looking sauce, pour the sauce into a blender and blitz until homogenized. Return the sauce to the saucepan to reheat, or simply pour into a warm serving bowl.